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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Poignant account of caring for wild animals

Reviewed by: Graeme Voyer

12/12/2009 1:00 AM | Comments: 0

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Lil Anderson with a couple of her tamer charges.

Pond Memories

More Tales from a Wildlife Rehabilitator

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By Lil Anderson

Turnstone Press, 161 pages, $17

Caring for orphaned or injured wild animals requires extraordinary skill and sensitivity.

Lil Anderson is an adept practitioner of this art; she has written an anecdotal account of her experiences as a wildlife rehabilitator that is poignant and highly readable.

Anderson maintains her rehabilitation centre on her property outside of Kenora, where she lives with her husband.

People send or bring animals from all over northwestern Ontario for her to nurture.

Amazingly, she is able to look after her charges while still working a full-time job at the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources in Kenora.

In this book, released by Winnipeg publisher Turnstone Press, a house better known for its literary fiction and poetry, Anderson describes caring for numerous animals, including a young moose, a fox, beavers, goslings, a porcupine and a fawn.

Turnstone published an earlier Anderson collection, Beavers Eh to Bea: Tales from a Wildlife Rehabilitator, in 2000.

Some of her stories are tragic, while others end happily, with the animal that she succored released back into the wild.

She has a sense of humour, at times self-deprecating, which is reflected in her narrative.

Anderson's experiences have given her insights into animal behaviour. She frequently uses the term hardwired; even animals who do not have the opportunity to learn from their parents know what to do in a given situation.

For example, the goslings that she raised knew instinctively to hide when they spotted an eagle. So much animal behaviour, Anderson shows, is innate.

Her observations recall a passage from the 20th-century French novelist Louis-Ferdinand Celine: "What's wonderful in the animal world is the way they know everything without telling each other ... and far far away! at the speed of light!"

Anderson says that raising wild animals is "an emotional roller-coaster." Indeed, she evokes the bittersweet emotions of returning an animal that she has cared for to the wild.

A successful release is, of course, the goal of her efforts, yet there is still sadness at leaving an animal to which she has devoted so much attention.

As a rehabilitator, Anderson is so conscientious. She always does what is in the best long-term interests of her animals.

She goes to great lengths to ensure that they receive the best possible care.

One of the hazards that Anderson faces at her rehabilitation centre is the bears that often traverse her property. As omnivores, they are a threat to her convalescing charges.

Anderson relates a particularly unnerving encounter with a rogue bear that penetrated her enclosures and killed several of her animals.

In addition to being a devoted wildlife rehabilitator, Anderson is a gifted writer and storyteller. And her love of animals shines through these pages. Anyone who shares her love of fauna will enjoy this book.

Graeme Voyer is a Winnipeg writer.

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition December 12, 2009 H8

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